A successful email marketing campaign is one that is well planned and meticulously thought-out. So where should you start?
Who will be the primary readers of the emails?
- New contacts that have been garnered through the website, research, etc
- • Longer term sales leads who have not converted into a sale
- • Regular customers
- Jot down points to define the readership. There may find there are a number of distinct groups that require their own email correspondence.
What Do Recipients of the Emails Want..
• Think about what the recipient will want to hear about?
• New contacts – offers, company news, case studies, references?
• Longer term sales leads – offers, company news, case studies, references?
• New customers who have placed an order within, for example the last month- garner feedback, provide exclusive offer.
• Regular customers- offers, get them to spread the word?
What Every Email Should Include..
• Company should always be mentioned in the ‘From’ field
• Use a relevant subject line- don’t use anything salesly, try to describe what is within the email.
• Personalise the email so that the email is specific to the recipient. For example, ’Hi Paul, welcome to the October edition of the Company Newsletter’.
• Ensure there is a one click opt out link readily available.
• Provide option for users to view the email in their browser.
• Reminder Text- try to let recipients know why they receive the email (‘You are receiving this email as you signed up for our newsletter on the website…
Copy- Getting the Right Balance..
• Keep content as succinct, short and easy to digest as possible.
• For any long articles- sum up in a title and short paragraph and link to the full article on the Company website
• Inject personality- find online voice- friendly, helpful, non-salesly.
How Often…
There are a number of points to remember when determining the frequency of the Company Newsletter:
• Inhouse resources- plan for at least six month; is there someone to cover correspondence, monthly organization and planning, etc.
• The frequency of news- a monthly (at most a bi-monthly) email may be sufficient.
What are the goals of the email campaign?
• Is it to pick up the phone and make an order?
• Request a quote?
• Go to the website?
Time Allocation..
Put aside an adequate amount of time to carry out each monthly campaign:
• Day 1- brainstorm topics for the newsletter, images that would suit
• Day 2- Write up articles (if they are to be added to website), create titles and short paragraphs, source relevant photos
• Day 3- Create email within Mailchimp; carry out test to check for spelling, etc.
• Day 4- Send email
• Day 6- Assess the email campaign- Mailchimp offers a wealth of reports
Company Policies and Alternative Email Addresses
• Get privacy policy in order. For example, how Company stores personal information
• Set up email addresses that can be used as the “Reply-to:” for campaigns
• Set up test email accounts with Yahoo, Gmail, Hotmail
• Prepare website and landing pages for delivery. Before sending email, get everything in order. Are all the landing pages that the email links to live and working?
REMEMBER: Ask the customers in the Company database for permission to send them email newsletters.
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